Barlowe, Wayne - God's Demon

Even though he worked roughly two hundred years ago there is yet a transcendent majesty to William Blake's vivid, mystical painting's and etchings. His idiosyncratic style is still fresh and captivating and this painting is something of an homage to him. Blake was one of the most interesting artists and poets of his day and I would be remiss in not mentioning that he, too, fell under the spell of John Milton's Paradise Lost, the single greatest influence on my Hell work.

Limbs stiff and trembling from the exercise, Eligor made his way up the palace stairs and entered the empty entrance hall. Usually, after newcomers entered the palace from a downpour, there would have been attendants ready and waiting to towel them down, but now there was no such courtesy. Instead the metallic tang of the blood and the uncomfortable feeling of it drying upon him only heightened his growing sense that all was not well. When he was back in his chambers he would have to spend much time cleaning himself. Only the distilled and still-irritating saline waters of the Acheron would remove the stain, a ritual that, considering his exhaustion, he did not look forward to.

For some reason only a relative few of the palace's many braziers were lit, and the shadowed areas that Eligor passed through seemed to him like ominous lakes of darkness. Trudging through the halls, past the infrequent distracted functionary or brick-laden worker, Eligor noted again with now-familiar sadness that the entire geography of the immense building had been altered. The mandated removal of any and all soul-bricks, a process that was still under way, had caused the complete rearrangement and, in some cases, structural weakening of the interior, leaving great holes, collapsed ceilings, or crudely supported walls. The dust of deconstruction was everywhere. And more than once he saw it kicked up by winds that, in the past, would never have been possible in the building when its integrity had been sound.

But even with conditions as they were, the palace retained some echoes of its grandeur, and the closer to its Audience Chamber he walked the more the great building resembled its former self. On his way to the stairs leading to his chambers, he peered through the columns of the arcade into the great space beyond and looked to the top of the pyramidal dais half-expecting to see Sargatanas seated on his throne. But only the shadows and emptiness greeted him. Algol's beam, almost always visible, was absent, occluded by the heavy weather above—something that he tried hard not to view as an omen. He imagined that Sargatanas was in his Shrine or his chambers, perhaps with Lilith. It was a thought that only served to deepen Eligor's melancholia; their time together, whether his lord got his wish or was destroyed trying, was drawing to a close.

And then the realization hit him like a hammer-blow. He understood, for the first time, just how much he would miss Sargatanas. Since the rebellion had begun every act, every word, had been about Beelzebub, his defenses, his armies, his cities, his tactics. Eligor had been so preoccupied with his office that he had not really had a moment to envision his world without his lord. Sargatanas had been a mentor and a paragon, a focal point and a guide, and now that Eligor saw a glimpse of what it might be like, of the emptiness he would feel, he did not like it.

He continued to his chambers, up the long, curving staircase and down the wide hall, past Valefar's sealed chambers and then to his own. As he entered and lit his braziers with a cast flurry of glyphs, he questioned if Sargatanas' vision was worth all of the incredible changes that had been wrought upon Hell. If the rebellion did not succeed would it have been the greatest act of selfishness imaginable to have plunged them all into this war? The question hung in his mind as he dipped a soft capillary-knot from the Wastes in the water and began to sponge himself as best as he could. The dull burn of the Acheron upon his exposed flesh and bone almost felt like welcome penance for the guilt he felt in doubting Sargatanas.

* * * * *

They left the Shrine together for the last time, and as they exited, Lilith could not help but wonder if Sargatanas had not brought her there as a last effort to get her to change her mind. He pulled the thick door shut and then turned to her and her suspicions were confirmed.

"You can change your mind, Lilith. If I do go back, it will mean that the way is clear for others. You could—"